A problem and a proposed solution.

Originally posted by Russ

So, there you have it. A lot to read, sorry about that, but would anyone be interested in becoming a mentor? Any further ideas?
-Russ

I'll be a mentor. Rating thing doesn't matter to me.

Originally posted by ouroboros
I'll be a mentor. Rating thing doesn't matter to me.

No one ever said I was brave! 😉

P-

Edit! I just feel I might take on more mentor games if I were not going to have my rating tweeked. I tend to try to play established pawn stars over newbies.

I like Phlabibit's idea. I'd sign up to mentor - if there's a way that it wouldn't squash my rating. So if the provision rating system worked to it didn't effect rated opponnets it would be great.

Then you could have active players sign up for number of mentor games. I could go to my profile and set it at (for example) 5 mentor games. When someone signs up AND I'm online and active - RHP would automaticlly sign me up for a game with them.

So my critieria would be
1) no negative impact on non-provisional ratings
2) let the mentor set how many mentor games to play
3) only players that are active - several moves per day
4) create the games only if the mentor is logged on and moving

That way the newbies will get started in a game right away and the mentors will not worry about thier ratings getting trashed. Mentors can welcome them to the site and encorage them to get thier stars.

What ever you decided, I know many will volunteer to help out.

Exy made a good point - perhaps a big factor driving away people is that the players they are initially paired up against, and find in open invites (or otherwise), tend to play a bit too slowly to meet the initial "thirst" for chess that has probably set them out seeking a chess site.

So I think that the "mentors", or perhaps "introductory players" should be players who are willing to move fast (several times a day) in those "introductory games" - at least well into the middle game. Many people would probably volunteer to play fast against newbies if they could set their own limit as to how many of these fast "introductory games" they'll accept at any given time. Then if their "introductory game" limit isn't filled, their names could appear in a list of some sort to the new players, from which they could select faster introductory games against the volunteers.

-Jarno

Ok, I guessed that rating killing newbs would be a problem. So maybe we need to factor mentor games in somehow to the rating calculation. I'll speak to Chris about this - he is the ratings man.

Another icon type would appear for mentor games - it would be classified as an entirely different game type in our underlying game type coding - so that is not a problem.

I'll start on this soon after I get back from a brief (forced) break. (Anyone heading south from Scotland on Wednesday morning- I'll be thumbing a lift somewhere along the M6 and M5....)

-Russ

Instead of 6 concurrent games indefinitely or 1000 free moves, how about one month free trial? You come to the site, you get a provisional rating as now, but you are free to join clans, enter tournaments and play as many games as you like - but - at the end of the first month you have to sign up?

I'm willing to serve too. I like the idea of signing up for a specified number of "mentor games" and then having some games assigned to me for the purpose. I'm not sure what the ideal criteria would be for allowing the RHP software to assign me a game automatically. The fact that I have made a few moves in a short period doesn't necessarily work. I often check RHP just before going to bed and sometimes have a few moves to make then. If I were then assigned to a mentor game with someone in Australia on that basis, I could end up quite out of phase with that person. It might be sensible to suggest a time period in the day when assignment of mentor games would be best.

The ratings question is certainly one where more than a few people are going to be concerned. I would be willing to play without a ratings guarantee, but I sense that you would get more mentors if the occasional 1800 level player who is just starting on the site would make less of a negative impact on the established player's rating.

My main concern at this time, with playing provos is that I can't count on them to show up and play. I finally got rid of a game that had been on the My Games page for two months with only about 15 moves. That's nothing but clutter and for someone like me, who prefers playing a reasonably limited number of games at a time (say about a dozen), I don't need the clutter. If I were wanting to play "mentor games" I would certainly want to specify both a reasonably short timeout and a short timebank. I'm sure that other potential mentors (and mentees) would prefer different combinations, but the new members will probably not understand the question.

I think it would be good if the new players, the ones who need the mentoring, were able not only to check a box or hit a button requesting the mentoring games, but were also able to give some clue about what strength of opponents they would like. I'm thinking of the random weak newbie showing up and getting paired with a very strong player, with the result that the newbie gets crushed and leaves. Or alternatively the reasonably strong new player getting paired with a "mentor" who turns out to be a few hundred ELO points weaker. Before I signed up, I actually looked at quite a few of the "Public Games" and got a clue about what I could expect from what kind of level. Now, I still wasn't sure where I would fall in the ratings because I hadn't actually played in several decades, but at least I felt I could probably play at some level eventually. I don't get the feeling that many of the new players bother to do even that.

Overall, I'd be more than happy to participate as a mentor, but I'm not sure that there is any solution that does not require the new player to take some initiative {him/her}self.

Paul

Sign me up for mentor.

Mike

I think this mentor system is a great idea. Also there could be some system put in so that newbies (pre subscribers) can have trial periods in joining a clan, thus guaranteeing games that will be played to completion and sort of dangling the carrot in front of the donkey scenario

Sign me up for mentoring.

-Robbo

Second kind of Mentor Game...

Mega Mentor Game:

A newbie starts one of these games, and anyone who is signed up as a mentor can make a move in any of the Mega Mentor Games as long at it is the Mentor's turn to move.

Sort of like a group game.

Just a thought.... I know others have wanted a way to play a group game like "David Tebb vs. RHP" or "Kasparov vs. World". This would almost ensure a game would move quick with several people peeking in to see if there are any moves waiting. Not sure how the rating would work.........

P-

im in for being a mentor.......here is what i think.....ANY game against a prvisional player should not be rated for someone who isnt provisional but only rated for the provisional player taht way the ratings arent chrush and the newcomer gets a fair rating

Originally posted by Exy
Instead of 6 concurrent games indefinitely or 1000 free moves, how about one month free trial? You come to the site, you get a provisional rating as now, but you are free to join clans, enter tournaments and play as many games as you like - but - at the end of the first month you have to sign up?

Allow them to enter tourneys, but not join clans. I know some serious clan leaders who will feel pretty annoyed when a lot of newbies join their clan, and after a month decide not to play any further.

New users won't be able to enter tournaments or clans - the drop out rate is just too high. It just isn't that practical.

-Russ

Originally posted by Russ
New users won't be able to enter tournaments or clans - the drop out rate is just too high. It just isn't that practical.

-Russ

I am talking from my own experience here, I'd like to hear what others felt. If I had come to this site and could have started playing as many games as a liked, joined a clan and entered a tournament, at the end of the first month I would have happily parted with my money.

The fact that I could only play 6 concurrent games meant that in order to get a true flavour of the site I stuck at it for 6 months before joining. I suggest it took me longer to find out cos my access was limited and I further suggest there are a lot of people out there far less patient than I.

So, if they could join clans and play tournaments and use the site completely for a free month trial, not only would the drop out rate decrease, the time it took for some to sign up would too because at the end of the free month trial I would imagine anyone who got that far would be hooked.

So, how about free month trial with unlimited games but still get adverts and banners. At the end of the month they have to sign up and if they don't then they drop down to 6 concurrent games and no clan / tournament access. There could be special clans for newbies run by these "mentors" and special short tournaments that would only last a month could be set up. Could this be worth a try?

Just my two penneth, you guys running the site must have more experience than I and you know how much extra work you want to take on to fix the problem.

I would like to be a mentor, but I have one "handicap": I play chess online one or 2 times a day, no more than that. Why not ask the ns (non-subscriber) what is they desired "moves frequency"? If you find someone that is happy with one move a day, I'm in.

You can add some prize for ns that play consistently for the choosen frequency during certain amount of time -- I don't know what prize, but I have a suggestion: being a ns you can join a tournament "only for ns", a kind of tournament you can join only one time, and only if you have a minimum move frequency and it's consistent, and you can count on the mentors to have this minimum achieved. So I think you will get plenty of ns trying to get a minimum to enjoy a tournament. Put an handicap, something like "one cannot disable email move notification while being a ns, but a ns that played 30 games to the bitter end can disable it".

Better than that, put a kind of ranking, and only the best ranked can join the "only one time" event. The ranking will be in moves frequency, or in the fullfilment of the desired moves frequency, not won games, so even a patzer can join it.

And for the ns that is a mentor too, offer only the increase in games. Put more options (10-20-30-50 games) to subscriber, but only 10 or 20 to ns.

That's a crazy idea I have...